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gaza health ministry
Israeli Analysis Affirms Gaza Health Ministry’s Official Palestinian Death Count
One Israeli expert placed discrepancies in the list at "around 1%." Another said the error rate appears even lower.
Feb 24, 2026
An Israeli analysis published Tuesday examining the Gaza Health Ministry's list of Palestinians killed during Israel's US-backed annihilation of the Gaza Strip largely affirmed the official death count, while noting some imperfections in the 2,000-page document.
Haaretz, Israel's oldest daily newspaper, dissected the Gaza Health Ministry's (GHM) database of Palestinians killed by Israeli forces in Gaza, which at the time contained nearly 70,000 names—it's now over 72,000—in part by using artificial intelligence to analyze the massive file.
"A consensus has taken shape: Even if the list has weaknesses, including the fact that it does not differentiate between combatants and civilians, it reflects the scale of the disaster inflicted on Gaza and its people," article author Nir Hasson wrote. "It also forms the basis for allegations that Israel committed war crimes, crimes against humanity, and even genocide."
Lee Mordechai, a historian at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem who says Israeli is committing genocide in Gaza, told Hasson, "It's clear that the list isn't 100% accurate and that it has errors, but I think they're around 1%."
Gabriel Epstein, an associate at the US-based Israel Policy Forum who was formerly skeptical of the GHM list, "now believes it is largely accurate and may even slightly undercount the dead," according to Hasson.
"Epstein reviewed the list obtained by Haaretz," the article states. "He found 24 duplicates and 38 entries with problems in the ID numbers. That means 99.91% of the entries were complete, with verified ID numbers. He also found that 64 deaths that had appeared on earlier lists were later removed, while 158 names removed by March of last year were added back."
The GHM list notably only contains the names of people who died from combat-related violence, not from "hunger, disease, accidents, or the collapse of the health system."
It also does not include the thousands of people who are missing and likely dead and buried beneath the rubble of the 80% of Gaza's buildings that have been destroyed or damaged during the war.
Other research, including multiple peer-reviewed studies in the prestigious British medical journal the Lancet, have also concluded that the ministry was undercounting the number of people killed by Israel's war on Gaza.
As for the issue of Hamas not differentiating between combatants and civilians on the ministry's death list, an investigation last year by Israeli journalist and filmmaker Yuval Abraham and Guardian senior international affairs correspondent Emma Graham-Harrison analyzed classified Israel Defense Forces intelligence data showing that 5 in 6 Palestinians killed by Israeli troops through the first 19 months of the war were civilians. The probe obliterated IDF claims of a historically low civilian-to-combatant kill ratio.
Last September, Former IDF Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi—who was in command for much of the war—said that “over 10%” of Gaza’s approximately 2.2 million people “were killed or injured” since October 2023. Halevi’s acknowledgment tracked with GHM figures showing at least 228,815 people killed or wounded at the time.
In January, Israeli media outlets including Haaretz, the Jerusalem Post, and the Times of Israel reported that the IDF accepted the accuracy of GHM's death count, which at the time stood at over 71,000.
Israeli officials and media, along with their supportive US counterparts during both the Biden and Trump administrations, once cast doubt upon or outright denied GHM figures because the ministry is under Hamas' control. These aspersions came in addition to widespread Israeli and US denials of Israel’s forced famine and starvation deaths and IDF war crimes in Gaza.
"As the months have passed, claims of fabrication and exaggeration have largely remained confined to Israeli television panels," Hasson wrote in the new analysis. "At the end of January, an apparent dispute over the number of dead seemed to end in Israel when a senior army source confirmed that the IDF recognizes that 70,000 people died, precisely the figure cited by Gazan authorities."
"Even if the argument over the total number of dead is, for now, largely settled, disagreement in Israel continues over who the dead were," he continued. "How many were gunmen, how many were affiliated with Hamas, how many were killed under circumstances that meet the conditions of international law?"
"None of this alters the stark figures in the table," Hasson added. "Of the recorded deaths, 20,876, about 30%, are young girls, teenage girls, and women. Another 3,220 were aged 65 and over, including the final name on the list, Tamam al-Batsh, who was 110 when she died."
While Israel officials continue to insist that GHM figures are "misleading and unreliable"—or even "fake"—Hasson noted the general consistency between Israeli and Palestinian tallies across past Israeli attacks on Gaza. During Operation Cast Lead (2008-09), the Palestinian count was 23% higher than Israel's. For Operation Pillar of Success (2012), Israel's tally of Gazan deaths was 11% higher than the Palestinian figure. In Operation Protective Edge (2014), the Palestinian count was 8% higher. And during 2021's Operation Guardian of the Walls, Palestinian officials counted 10% more Gaza deaths than Israel.
The United Nations and US administrations of both major political parties have long acknowledged the GHM's accounting of Palestinian casualties in Israeli attacks, including the assault that began in October 2023.
Hasson noted that "it has been increasingly harder to find Israeli officials commenting on the subject" of the GHM death count in the ongoing war as evidence of its accuracy mounts.
"Since the war began," he said, "Israel has made no serious effort to demonstrate that the list is false or to present an alternative. It has not proven even once that a person listed as deceased is in fact alive."
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After 2 Years of Denial, IDF Confirms 70,000+ Killed in Gaza—But Denies Famine
"The real figure is much higher," said one UK lawmaker. "This is a 'ceasefire' in name only. The slaughter goes on."
Jan 29, 2026
After two years of denial and deception, the Israel Defense Forces acknowledged Wednesday for the first time that over 70,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since October 2023, while continuing to deny the famine Israel caused by blocking humanitarian aid from entering the obliterated strip.
Israeli media including the Times of Israel, the Jerusalem Post, Haaretz, and others reported that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) accepts the accuracy of the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry's (GHM) death toll, which currently stands at least 71,667, with more than 171,000 others wounded and 9,500 missing and presumed dead and buried beneath the rubble of bombed buildings.
"How many years did we spend screaming, with checked and re-checked figures, lists showing names and ID numbers, being told the numbers were completely fanciful despite rigorous, transparent verification, and now the IDF quietly accepts that they were correct all along," Beirut-based journalist Séamus Malekafzali said on X in response to the IDF admission.
Experts—including the authors of multiple peer-reviewed studies in the prestigious British medical journal The Lancet—assert that the actual death toll in Gaza is much higher than reported. Last June, a study published in Nature reported 84,000 deaths in Gaza. Others say the toll could be even higher, with one Economist study estimating between 77,000-109,000 Gazans killed by Israeli forces.
"We should not care what the IDF accepts or not—they perpetrated the genocide," said Jake Romm, the US representative for the Hind Rajab Foundation, which tracks suspected IDF war criminals and is named after a 5-year-old Palestinian girl massacred along with relatives and rescue workers by Israeli occupation forces on January 29, 2024. "Their communications are in service of that project."
"This is, in any event, an admission that will only be used to discredit the real, much higher death toll as the scale of the atrocity becomes known," Romm added.
Israeli academic Ori Goldberg was also skeptical of the IDF's admission, asserting on X: "'Accepts' means that even the vast network of lies no longer holds. If the IDF 'accepts' 70,000, it has killed innumerably more."
While the IDF accepted GHM's death toll, it argued that the famine in Gaza—which officially lasted from August-December 2025, according to the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification, the standard international framework for classifying food insecurity and malnutrition—did not happen.
GHM says at least 453 Palestinians, including 150 children, have died of malnutrition in Gaza since October 2023. The IDF contends that the figure is a mix of lies and misleading reporting about people who had preexisting health conditions before they starved to death.
However, famine experts argue that Israel orchestrated a carefully planned campaign of mass starvation in Gaza.
Throughout the war, Israeli leaders, their supporters abroad, and mainstream US media attempted to discredit GHM casualty figures by casting aspersions upon the "Hamas-run" ministry. This, despite Israeli military intelligence deeming the figures accurate and historical confirmations of their reliability.
"The phrase *Hamas* Health Ministry was used as a slur for years to signal unreliability, even though it was pointed out again and again that its numbers had always held up," noted journalist Jasper Nathaniel, adding sardonically that "I’m sure the 'Pallywood' crowd will be rushing to apologize today."
The International Center for Justice for Palestinians (ICJP) said on social media that "every media outlet that cast doubt over these figures with dogwhistling phrases like 'Hamas-run MoH' is complicit in these killings."
"In truth, the 71,000+ figure is conservative," ICJP added. "Palestinian bodies are buried under the rubble and can't be counted and many more have died from malnutrition due to Israel's deliberate starvation of Palestinians. Different tools, same outcome: Israeli genocide of Palestinians."
In the United States—which has supported Israel's annihilation of Gaza with tens of billions of dollars in armed aid and diplomatic cover including vetoes of numerous United Nations Security Council ceasefire resolutions during both the Biden and Trump administrations—the House of Representatives approved a bipartisan amendment in June 2024 that banned US officials from using State Department resources to cite GHM casualty figures.
The amendment's lead sponsor, Rep. Jared Moskowitz (D-Fla.)—whose all-time top campaign contributor is the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC)—contended that “at the end of the day, the Gaza Ministry of Health is the Hamas Ministry of Health."
Former President Joe Biden faced genocide denial accusations for casting aspersions upon GHM reports. President Donald Trump has also said he does not believe that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza.
A senior IDF official told the Times of Israel that the military is in the process of determining how many of the Gaza dead were members of Hamas or other militant groups.
While the Israeli government has claimed a historically low civilian-to-combatant kill ratio in Gaza, classified IDF intelligence data obtained last year during an investigation by Israeli journalist and filmmaker Yuval Abraham of +972 Magazine and Local Call and Guardian senior international affairs correspondent Emma Graham-Harrison revealed that 5 in 6 Palestinians—or 83%—killed by the IDF through the first 19 months of the US-backed war were civilians.
Former Israel Defense Forces Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi—who led the IDF through most of the war—acknowledged after retiring last year that "over 10%" of Gaza's population, or about 220,000 Palestinians, had been killed or wounded as of September 2025.
“This is not a gentle war," Halevi said at the time, "we took the gloves off from the first minute."
Following the Hamas-led October 7 attack on Israel, the IDF dramatically loosened its rules of engagement, effectively allowing an unlimited number of civilians to be killed when targeting a single Hamas member, no matter how low-ranking.
The IDF’s use of massive ordnance, including US-supplied 1,000- and 2,000-pound “bunker buster” bombs capable of leveling entire city blocks, and utilization of artificial intelligence to select targets has resulted in staggering numbers of civilian deaths, including numerous instances of dozens or more people being massacred in single strikes.
Through it all, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other Israeli political and military leaders claimed that the IDF, "the most moral army in the world," went to great lengths to avoid harming civilians.
While Israeli leaders scoffed at war crimes allegations, South Africa filed a genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice in The Hague. The ICJ, a UN body, subsequently issued multiple provisional orders for Israel to prevent genocidal acts. Israel has been accused of ignoring these orders, and last September a panel of UN experts concluded that Israel was committing genocide in Gaza.
Later, the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Netanyahu and former Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for alleged crimes against humanity and war crimes in Gaza, including murder and forced starvation.
The killing isn't over. Since a tenuous ceasefire between Israel and Hamas took effect last October 10, Israeli forces have killed more than 500 Palestinians in over 1,200 violations of the truce. Palestinians—mostly children and infants—are also still dying of exposure to cold weather as Israel continues to restrict the entry of aid into Gaza.
"They said Palestinians were exaggerating. Lying. Propagandists," Independent UK Member of Parliament Shockat Adam said on X Thursday. "Now, even the IDF accepts 70,000+ killed in Gaza. The real figure is much higher. This is a 'ceasefire' in name only. The slaughter goes on."
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'There Is No Ceasefire' Say Gazans as Israeli Strikes Kill, Wound Hundreds
"The occupation targets whoever it wants, stopping and resuming the genocide every few days as if playing with our lives," said one young woman from Gaza.
Oct 31, 2025
More than 800 Palestinians have been killed or wounded since the October 10 truce between Israel and Hamas, leaving many residents of the still-embattled, still-starved strip to question whether there is actually any "ceasefire" at all.
“There is no ceasefire,” Hala, a 20-year-old woman who was awakened from her sleep Tuesday when an Israeli missile struck her neighbor's home, told The Intercept on Thursday. "The occupation targets whoever it wants, stopping and resuming the genocide every few days as if playing with our lives.”
Hala was looking forward to her upcoming wedding. But the Israeli attack killed her fiancé's cousin, his wife, and all but one of their children. The wedding has now been postponed.
The slain relatives were among the at least 104 Palestinians killed by Israeli strikes on Tuesday, according to the Gaza Health Ministry—whose casualty figures have been deemed accurate by Israeli military officials and a likely undercount by multiple peer-reviewed studies.
The Israel Defense Forces claimed Tuesday's attacks targeted "dozens of key terrorists," however IDF officials provided details on just 26 suspected militants. The Gaza Health Ministry said 46 children and 20 women were among those killed by the Israeli strikes.
“There is no doubt this is an attack on civilians,” Dr. Morten Rostrup, a physician with Doctors Without Borders working at al-Aqsa Hospital in Gaza City, told The Intercept. “Do we really call this a ceasefire?”
The Gaza Health Ministry says at least 211 people have been killed and 597 others wounded since the truce went into effect on October 10.
Since the Gaza genocide began in response to the Hamas-led attacks of October 7, 2023, Israeli forces have killed at least 68,519 Palestinians and wounded over 170,300 others. Around 9,500 Palestinians remain missing and feared dead and buried beneath rubble. Leaked classified IDF documents suggest that over 80% of slain Palestinians were civilians.
Gaza officials say Israeli forces have violated the ceasefire at least 125 times. Meanwhile, Israel has cited relatively minor violations of the truce by Hamas, which have resulted in only a handful of Israeli casualties, as justification for the resumption of strikes that have left hundreds dead and wounded.
Still, US President Donald Trump—whose administration played a key role in brokering the truce—insists that the ceasefire is holding.
“I think none of us should be surprised that Israel has continued breaking the ceasefire,” Tariq Kenney-Shawa, a US policy fellow at New York-based Al-Shabaka, The Palestinian Policy Network, told The Intercept.
"It very much still fits into the Trump administration’s bigger picture, because as long as they can kind of say that there is a quote-unquote ‘ceasefire’ in effect, as long as they can say, ‘At least it’s better than before,’ that enables the US and the rest of the international community to let up on the pressure on Israel and to return to business as usual," added Kenney-Shawa, who is Palestinian and whose family is from Gaza.
Khaled Elgindy, a visiting scholar at Georgetown University’s Center for Contemporary Arab Studies, said, "For Trump and for the Israelis, what matters is the appearance of a ceasefire."
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